'Farcical disabled minister Tory U-turn shows what we knew - they don't care'

15 December 2023 , 12:12

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Rishi Sunak's government appeared to U-turn on scrapping the role of minister for disabled people (Image: AFP via Getty Images)

To explain what has happened with the minister for disabled people role in the last 24 hours, let me give you an idea of how my day went down yesterday.

Late Wednesday night, I filed my original column on how we didn’t have a minister after Rishi Sunak made 'stab vest' Tom Pursglove the first Minister for Legal Migration. Rolling into Thursday morning, we still had no news." Then come 1pm, TV channels were reporting what appeared to be confirmation from Number 10 that the role would be scrapped.

So that was that, finally confirmation of what we already knew - the Tories don’t care about us. Edit the piece, change it to confirmation of how much they hate us, finish work for Christmas - nice one Rach. But not for long.

Mims Davies' cockapoo won Westminster Dog of the Year in 2023 (Wiktor Szymanowicz/REX/Shutterstock)

The non-announcement caused absolute uproar with everyone from disabled campaigners and charities, to the opposition and even Paralympians condemning the decision. So imagine everyone’s shock - and to be honest just plain confusion - when at 4pm the DWP announced via Twitter that the government had appointed Mims Davies to the job.

Or so we thought. Remember this is the Tories we’re talking about so it’s never the good news we hoped for. Not only was the apparent U-turn brushed under the carpet, but the announcement also missed out on the fact that Davies isn’t a minister of state - she’s a parliamentary undersecretary, meaning the role has been downgraded again. She also - according to her biography on X - still working on social mobility (her previous DWP role) and is the Youth Police Police and Crime Commissioner.

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So that’s the lives of 14 million people on top of two other jobs - oh and let's not forget her constituency. Nothing says “you will continue to see a government showing strong support for disabled people and disabled issues” like giving our representation to someone who already has three jobs.

Now I can’t possibly speculate - the plan might well have been to deny in the morning and then announce in the afternoon - but to me, this looks like the Tories weren’t expecting disabled people to raise our voices so loudly and had no choice but to try and appease us.

So onto Mims. What will she be like as “minister” (undersecretary) for disabled people? Well, according to her social media, she’s passionate about the role because her dad lived with a head injury for more than 25 years and that meant her family were on benefits. “Be assured I get it” she posted.

However, this doesn’t explain why she has voted against paying higher benefits over a longer period for those unable to work due to illness or disability not once, not twice but 10 times. She also voted for a reduction in welfare spending (cuts) a whopping 27 times.

The only other thing I know about Mims Davies is that her cockapoo TJ is this year’s Westminister Dog of the Year, so to quote one of my social media “fans”, “I like your dog, not you though, a sanctimonious ghoul”.

The Tories are trying desperately to cling on to voters and their power by making immigration the priority and turning people even further against those who struggle the most, while showing just how much thought they give minorities like disabled people.

After thirteen years of the Tories making life scarier, harder and, for many, just plain unliveable, disabled people deserve a minister with our best interests at heart. We deserve plans to protect us this winter and a benefits system that supports us and doesn’t at times seem like it’s out to make us the enemy - either through spending millions on stopping claims to campaign to “Crackdown” on workshy benefit shirkers”.

We deserve a government and media that doesn’t vilify us and turn the public against us to the point where we’re all called scroungers and fakers if we get our nails done or have iPhones. Disabled people are already on our knees at the mercy of the Tories, we deserve someone who will fight for us - not the scraps of a failing government.

Rachel Charlton-Dailey